Chapter 48 Chapter 10: A New Round of Game Between Vertical and Horizontal

In 316 BC, the two ethnic minority states Ju and Shu in the southwest had a war over territorial issues. The country of Ju was unable to defeat the country of Shu, so it sent people to ask for help from the country of Qin. The state of Qin is located in the west of China, and there are many minority regimes in the surrounding area, among which the most powerful are Dali and Yiqu in the northwest and Shu in the southwest.They do not obey the leadership of Qin State, and their relationship with Qin State is up and down.Generally speaking, there are fewer good times and more bad times.Qin often plundered their lands, and they launched counterattacks or invasions from time to time.Since entering the Warring States Period, there have been several large-scale wars between the Qin State and the ethnic minorities.

In 461 BC, Qin State captured the capital of Dali (now Dali, Shaanxi Province), forcing Dali to retreat northward. In 451 BC, the State of Qin built a city in Nanzheng (now Hanzhong, Shaanxi Province) to prevent the invasion of the State of Shu. In 387 BC, the Shu army raided and captured Nanzheng.In the same year, the Qin army launched a counterattack and took back Nanzheng. In 444 BC, Qin attacked Yiqu and captured the king of Yiqu. In 430 B.C., Yiqu invaded Qin Dynasty and went deep into Weinan. The most recent time was in 318 BC when the Five Kingdoms attacked Qin. The Qin army went out of Hangu Pass to fight back and won a complete victory.However, under the instigation of Gongsun Yan, Yiqu took the opportunity to attack Qin and defeated the Qin army at Libo (place name, unknown today).

It can be seen from this that both Shu and Yiqu were quite powerful at that time, and they posed a certain threat to Qin. When King Qin Hui received the distress letter from King Ju, he immediately realized that this was a great opportunity to expand Qin's power to the southwestern Bashu area.He immediately summoned his important ministers and asked for their opinions on attacking Shu. Unexpectedly, the first person who jumped out to object was Xiangguo Zhang Yi. "Shu is just a barbarian country in the southwest. The land is remote and the road is far away. Even if you mobilize your troops and beat it down through exhaustion, it will not be profitable, and you will not become the name of the overlord. In my opinion, It is better to attack South Korea first, capture Xincheng and Yiyang in South Korea, threaten Erzhou (Eastern Zhou Kingdom and Western Zhou Kingdom), seize the Jiuding, which symbolizes the power to rule the world, and take the emperor to command the princes, this is the right way of Wangye."

When Zhang Yi said this, Qin Huiwang felt that it made sense.For more than ten years, Zhang Yi has been his right-hand man, and his trust in Zhang Yi has reached the point of obeying his words.What's more, the historical experience since ancient times also made him feel that holding the emperor in his own hands is indeed more important than other things. At this time, a general named Sima Cuo stood up and said: "I oppose the opinion of Xiangguo. I heard that if you want to make the country rich, you must expand the land; if you want to make the army strong, you must make the people rich; , we must spread benevolence. If these three things are done well, the king's career will come naturally, so why is there any need to grab Jiuding and hold the emperor?"

Qin Huiwang looked at Sima Cuo in surprise, because he always thought that Sima Cuo was just a martial artist, and he didn't expect to be able to speak such level words.He nodded and encouraged Sima Cuo to continue. Sima Cuo said: "The Zhou Dynasty is the clan of the princes of the world; Qi State is the ally of South Korea. If the Zhou Dynasty has a premonition that it will lose Jiuding, South Korea knows that it will lose Sanchuan. They will unite and rely on Qi and Zhao. Please help Yu Chu and Wei. At that time, the Zhou Dynasty dedicated the nine tripods to the Chu State, and South Korea dedicated the three rivers to the Wei State, and the Qin State could only stare aside. Therefore, attacking South Korea to force Zhou is actually the next strategy. thought it was impossible.”

This is obviously against Zhang Yi. Zhang Yi retorted: "That's not true. I've heard that the court is fighting for fame, and the market is fighting for profit. Now the Zhou Dynasty is the court, and Sanchuan is the market. If we don't occupy it, Qi and Chu will occupy it, so we must act first. powerful." Sima Cuo said: "You are not right. Qin's top priority is to expand its territory and strengthen its strength. Shu is a barbarian country in the southwest. Now it is at war with Ju. We will take this opportunity to attack Shu, just like wolves chasing sheep. The same, without any effort. Seize the land of Shu, you can expand the territory of Qin; plunder the property of Shu, you can make the people of Qin gain real benefits, and at the same time expand the military of Qin." At this point, Sima Cuo paused. After a while, he looked at King Qin Hui, then at Zhang Yi, and then said slowly, "More importantly, after annexing the land of Bashu, the Qin army can go eastward along the river and directly attack the state of Chu. When the state of Chu is destroyed, Then the overall situation of the world has been decided.”

Hearing this sentence, Zhang Yi couldn't help but look at Sima Cuo with admiration.For Zhang Yi, the so-called Lianheng means "to defeat Qi and Chu with the power of Qin, Han and Wei".South Korea and Wei are the targets of struggle; Qi and Chu are the targets of crusade. "There must be a war between Qin and Qi and Chu." He often said that.At that time, among the princes in the world, Qin was the strongest, followed by Qi and Chu.If Qin wants to annex the world, it is impossible for Qi and Chu to agree, and it can only be resolved by force.The reason why Zhang Yi advocated attacking Sanchuan and intimidating the Zhou Dynasty was that he wanted to hold Han and Wei in his hands and obtain a forward base for attacking Qi and Chu.

He didn't expect that Sima Cuo proposed another path-first destroy Bashu, then destroy Chu, and then annex the world. Zhang Yi is not a stubborn person, he can see Sima Cuo's brilliance after a little thought.And more importantly, if Sima Cuo's plan is implemented, for Qin, it will be nothing more than pushing back the time to attack South Korea; but for Chu, it will be a huge threat.In the future game between Qin and Chu, it will undoubtedly greatly benefit Qin. Regarding Sima Cuo's family background, it is necessary to introduce.His ancestor was originally a historian of the Zhou Dynasty, and later migrated to the Jin State. During the Warring States Period, he was divided into three branches, one in Wei, one in Zhao, and one in Qin.Sima Cuo is naturally a branch of Qin, and his descendants have always served Qin until Qin unified the world.After the fall of the Qin Dynasty, Sima became an official of the Han Dynasty.During the period of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, a descendant of Sima Cuo compiled a history book, which was hailed as "the swan song of the historian, the Lisao without rhyme".

This descendant is named Sima Qian, and that history book is "Historical Records". King Qin Hui finally adopted Sima Cuo's opinion.So in June of the same year, King Qin Hui ordered Sima Cuo to lead his army to invade Shu through Hanzhong.The king of Shu personally led his troops to resist in Jiameng (now Jiange, Sichuan Province), but fled to Wuyang (now Pengshan, Sichuan Province) after failing.Sima Cuo took advantage of the sheep again and wiped out Ba and Ju.Since then, Qin's sphere of influence has expanded to today's Sichuan and Chongqing areas. Some people in later generations commented: Shang Yang's reform laid a social, political, and economic foundation for Qin to unify the world; Sima's mistaken destruction of Shu laid a strategic foundation for Qin to unify the world.

After the Qin State annexed Bashu, due to inconvenient transportation, it did not fully control these areas in a short period of time. It could only adopt the "Jimi (jimi, win over control) policy" to win over and control the local ethnic minorities.For example, the state of Qin still enshrined the children of the king of Shu as marquises, and asked them to marry princesses of the state of Qin as wives for generations; implemented preferential taxation policies for the land of Bashu to reduce the burden on the people, etc.Despite this, the local ethnic minorities have never stopped their resistance to Qin.Sima Cuo, as an expert on Bashu issues in the Qin State, later led troops into Shu to suppress the rebellion more than once, and made great military exploits.

While solving the Southwest issue, the Northwest issue was also put on the agenda.In 314 BC, Qin State sent troops to attack Yiqu, captured 25 cities in one fell swoop, and greatly expanded its power in the northwest. In this way, Qin had no worries, so he devoted all his energy to the east and accelerated his military and diplomatic offensives against the countries in the east.